On a music forum recently, I was asked to produce a graphical guide (i.e., lots of screenshots!) to describe how I'd go about ripping and tagging a variety of classical music CDs, given my adherence to the Axioms of Classical Music. The particular person making the request was using Windows, so I decided the ripping and tagging guides should use that operating system and some freely available software suitable for the task on that platform. However, I myself only use Linux at home -and, in particular, the ripping and tagging software I wrote myself for that platform.
So, my guides to ripping and tagging have been duplicated, depending on what your choice of operating system happens to be (and, sorry Apple fans: I don't use Apple and cannot comment on how to do the job on that platform!)
For Windows Users
These articles use Exact Audio Copy to do the ripping (because I wanted to use entirely free-of-charge software) and MP3Tag to do the tagging (for the same reason). The point in these articles is to get across the principles of ripping and tagging, not the specifics as to how to use a particular piece of software, however, so I hope they'll be useful whatever specific software you choose to use. The various scenarios discussed are:
- 1 CD containing a single composition by a single composer
- 1 CD containing two compositions by a single composer
- 1 CD containing multiple compositions by a single composer
- 1 CD containing multiple compositions by multiple composers
- 1 'mood' or 'themed' CD
- 2+ CDs containing a single composition by a single composer
- A large box set of symphonies by Beethoven
Even though you may regard the first of these scenarios as being so obvious as to not be worth investigating, I recommend you read it before reading any of the others, since it covers things which the others don't do (such as how to install and configure the EAC music ripper, how to choose album art and so on).
For Linux Users
For each of the articles written for Windows users above, I've produced a near-exact equivalent article for anyone running Linux. On that platform, I prefer to use my own Classical CD Ripper and Classical CD Tagger tools to do the ripping and tagging jobs. Once more, the scenarios covered are:
- 1 CD containing a single composition by a single composer
- 1 CD containing two compositions by a single composer
- 1 CD containing multiple compositions by a single composer
- 1 CD containing multiple compositions by multiple composers
- 1 'mood' or 'themed' CD
- 2+ CDs containing a single composition by a single composer
- A large box set of symphonies by Beethoven
Again, even though you might think the first of these scenarios is a bit obvious, I suggest you give it a read anyway, since it covers how to install and configure the CCDR and CCDT tools, which the other articles in the series will already assume you have done.
Whether you are a Linux or a Windows user, if I've missed your particular favourite scenario, drop me a line ([email protected]) or via the comments here and let me know what you'd like to see covered/explained.